Step Factory

I couldn't wait for the new Marcus Prolo
videos to come out, and I got them from
newideafitness today. So tonight I tore open
Step Factory.

It is approximately 35 minutes of complex
choreography at what I would say is upper-
intermediate intensity.

Marcus works out by himself in a room
decorated with solid-color banners. Pretty
minimalist decor, basically. The music is
instrumental but I haven't heard it before,
and I thought it had a really good beat--hard
to describe, but kinda like a good rock-n-roll
beat.

How to describe the moves? Marcus does his
thing of starting off with fairly simple though
not totally basic moves (stomps, knee raises,
skates on the step, cha chas on the step and
layers on so seamlessly and efficiently that
before you know it you're doing a combo
like: Knee-up straddle, stomps off the front
of the step into a reverse skate/stomp on the
floor, quick-scissors over the step, stomp-
over-the-top. Whew!

Another combo is something like: three-
steps over the step, stomps around the
corner, reverse-straddle over the top!

The "quick scissor" I'm talking about is that
move where you go over the top, but swing
your back leg behind to land in front of the
step first. Marcus speeds it up a bit, but it's
very doable. In general you want a step that's
got length, rather than height. He does a lot
of moves on top of the step, like a "quick
rocking horse" and the triple step.

The only beef I might have about Marcus
Prolo videos is that they're typically only
about 30-35 minutes. Although the DVD
here says 43 minutes, the 35 minute includes
an active warmup.

But any Marcus fan will be very pleased with
this one! I give it an A.

Instructor comments:
Fantastic! Marcus just gets better and better.
IMO he is one of the ablest cuers out there.
He has a way of edging you into doing
complex choreography without any pressure
or hoopla. Good visual cueing, good timing
and a relaxed, down-to-earth demeanor.
And of course, he is easy on the eyes!

Marcus is one of the step instructors I credit
with first having given me hope that I could
master complex step. This still holds true;
there aren't many other instructors whose
cueing could've guided me through the kind
of complex moves he introduces
here...without constant rewinding on my
part. I got 95% of the moves with minimal
rewinds, and I'm no choreo expert.